Just an Invention
by ClevernessRenamed
Summary: Spoilers for Human Nature. “And quite an eye for the pretty girls.” she said, pointing at the messy drawing of the girl on the page. TenRose
1. Just an Invention

A/N: Something to make me feel better about Human Nature.

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"And quite an eye for the pretty girls." she said, pointing at the messy drawing of the girl on the page.

John immediately turned to babbling, obviously not wanting to offend the lady.

"Oh no no, she's just an invention, this character… Rose, I call her. Rose."

An invention. A character.

He stared thoughtfully at the page, trying to remember this girl who he seemed to know ever so vaguely.

When concentrating, he could remember her obnoxiously blonde locks, her darkened mascara'd eyes (whatever that was), the way she laughed with him, grabbed his hand and hugged him. How her smile was so bright and how she'd slip her tongue between her teeth at moments of teasing and concentration. He imagined her considerably more vividly than the several other girls who had come up in his dreams, somehow her face just seemed to stay with him, in his mind.

His dreams told him that she was from London, with a very rude and cruel mum. At this point, his mind worked through fabrications of odd things like big green ugly creatures with zippers on their heads and gas masked zombies. But somehow… she was always there. Always beside him.

He wondered what kind of person would trust him so immensely while facing such horrors. He wasn't a god or a miracle worker and he was even more sure of that when he was dreaming. In fact, he felt much less like god in his dreams, the last of his kind, or something of the sort. He felt a great burden when he was "the Doctor", something that only seemed to go away when this Rose person was near.

He blinked back down at the page.

He did seem to lose her often, though.

To metal beings and such. Particularly the metal types. One with a bronze body and a blue eye and the other with a silver metal body, standing as tall as a human, or even taller.

He lost her several times, he recalled, sometimes even by his own hands, once locking her into his blue box and sending her away.

He'd had a different face then, a rather less handsomer one, if he did say so himself. Big nose, big ears, thinly cropped hair and all that.

Then she came back, all shining and bright, her eyes glowing with power infinite. Beauty herself was no match for how the Rose girl had looked at that moment, powerful and godlike.

Then he'd done it in this body too, sending her to a different dimension.

She came back again, he remembered, and he wondered vaguely how stubborn she was, or how much she cared about him to keep coming back at the worst times. But this one, this time, a man rushed in at the last moment and swept her away for good.

Then his imagination brought it all down to a beach. A very… empty beach. Just him and her. The wind had been blowing hard, whipping her blonde locks all over her face, but he couldn't feel it. He hadn't been there. Some kind of… image, or another.

She couldn't touch him.

He remembered dreaming useless awkward attempts at conversations, like how she'd been doing without him. He remembered her telling him that she loved him and he remembered saying something stupid in return.

Wasting time, of which he had so little. A bit ironic in the fact that he lived on a ship that went through time and space with ease.

Then, with the moment drawing so close, he'd opened his mouth to make his own confession.

And that's when he'd wake up.

He blinked again and tried to mentally shake off the thoughts.

Just as everything else, he had accepted that it was just a fabrication, the workings of an overly creative mind, but sometimes, he could almost believe that this one was true.

Something told him it was real, that somehow this girl was more real than he could have hoped.

And somehow he didn't like the idea of that, the idea of having a girl so close to his heart, only to lose her in the end.

He didn't like the idea, because sometimes, just sometimes, he could hear her laughing into his ear, reading his books from over his shoulder, whispering advice to him at moments of stupidity. Just like she was now, clicking her tongue at him in mock anger.

He brought his attention back to the page, remembering his company.

"Seems to disappear later on…" he mumbled carelessly as shrugged his shoulders up apprehensively.


	2. Can you change back?

"Can you change back?" she asks, her eyes so full of hope.

He'd seen that kind of hope before. In someone else's eyes.

Someone else he now remembers with painful accuracy, right down to the last heavily mascara'd eyebrow above her eye. Someone he hoped he never would have forgotten, and yet the proof that he has is standing right in front of him.

And now he knows why he fell for Joan. Why this woman, despite being so wiser, reminds him of someone else so far away.

But they're different, whispers voices in his head. One lost a husband, one lost a father. One is younger, full of imagination and the other is older, wiser, and knows better than to believe in silly things like aliens and monsters.

"Yes." He says, as simply and succinctly as he said it the last time he heard those words.

"Will you?" she asks, edging closer, as if she's straining to hear his voice.

By all accounts, yes, he can. He can live a life, have children, grow old, just like he saw from that little watch. Those few visions that made it that much harder to let go. To turn back. To say goodbye. To die.

But by similar accounts, he can't. He can't turn his back on the universe, he can't let things happen they way they would without him. He can't let people die, he can't let time get disrupted from her course. He can't leave the TARDIS behind.

But in the end, he does have it. He has a choice. Yes or no. Human or Time Lord. Old age or immortality.

The difference between Joan and Rose is rather clearer now.

He fixes her with an even look as he gives his answer. "No."

And that's the truth. And that's the difference.

He knows, that if he could have changed back to his old self when she'd asked all that time ago, he would have.

He knows that if Joan had been a different person asking him the same thing, he would have said yes. He knows that if he had been someone else, he would have said yes, but he's not. He's the Doctor. John Smith, no matter how many times he tells her otherwise, is gone.

He asks Joan to come with him, even offering her a chance for them to be together. At least a shot. Which is more than what he had given anyone, even Rose.

But he hadn't been human then. He had fallen in love, oh yes, but he had never pursued it. He would never have allowed himself to. There were so many futures and so many of them ended in heartbreak. And he didn't want to face that.

This whole adventure makes him wonder all the more at what would have happened if he hadn't been a coward. If he had been willing to risk losing the one he loved so dearly if it meant that they were together. If he had been willing to watch her die if it meant he had more time with her.

But that's it, he supposes. Differences and choices make people who they are. John Smith and the Doctor, no matter how much they are alike, how much they look alike, are not the same person.

Both of them gave their hearts to humans, both of them lost their hearts to humans, but one was willing to have loved and lost than have never loved at all.

John Smith wasn't lonely. John Smith had a life. John Smith had a love and a predictable future. John Smith had one heart and a human brain.

John Smith, in the end, was a much more courageous man than the Doctor ever could have been. John Smith would have allowed himself to love, whether he saw a future of heartbreak or not. Because John Smith would have known, that not allowing himself to fall in love would have hurt more in the end.


End file.
